Abstract
Consuming wild foods is part of the food ways of people in many societies, including farming populations throughout the world. Knowledge of non-domesticated food resources is part of traditional and tacit ecological knowledge, and is largely transmitted through socialization within cultural and household contexts. The context of this study, a small village in Northeast Thailand, is one where the community has experienced changes due to the migration of the parental generation, with the children being left behind in the village to be raised by their grandparents.A case study approach was used in order to gain holistic in-depth insight into children's traditional ecological knowledge as well as patterns of how children acquire their knowledge regarding wild food resources. Techniques used during field data collection are free-listing conducted with 30 village children and the use of a sub-sample of children for more in-depth research. For the sub-sample part of the study, wild food items consisted of a selection of 20 wild food species consisting of 10 species of plants and 10 species of animals. Semi-structured interviews with photo identification, informal interviews and participatory observation were utilized, and both theoretical and practical knowledge scored. The sub-sample covers eight households with boys and girls aged between 10–12 years old from both migrant families and non-migrant families. The knowledge of children was compared and the transmission process was observed.The result of our study shows that there is no observable difference among children who are being raised by grandparents and those being raised by their parents, as there are different channels of knowledge transmission to be taken into consideration, particularly grandparents and peers. The basic ability (knowledge) for naming wild food species remains among village children. However, the practical in-depth knowledge, especially about wild food plants, shows some potential eroding.
Highlights
In many locations around the world, as in rural Northeast Thailand, settled farmers have a reliance on wild food resources gathered from the agricultural landscape as well as from within the villages in which they reside [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8]
One of the primary questions we had in developing the research presented in this paper is what do children know about wild foods and is there a difference between children who are being raised by grandparents compared to those being raised by their parents? Will we find an indication of the hindrance of transmission that can lead to loss? This loss has been reported in a number of studies at various world locations [24,25,26,27]
This study presents an exploratory look at children's theoretical and practical knowledge of wild foods in a village in Northeast Thailand
Summary
In many locations around the world, as in rural Northeast Thailand, settled farmers have a reliance on wild food resources gathered from the agricultural landscape (fields, ditches, pathways) as well as from within the villages in which they reside [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8]. The contributions of edible wild resources to the wellbeing of rural households are wildly recognized in many different respects They are vital components to the daily diet and nutrient intake and are important during times of crisis [8,12,14,15,16,17,18,19]. They can be found close to human settlements for ease of acquisition and provide nourishment and variety in the diet [20,21] These edible wild resources can contribute to health maintenance as functional or medicinal foods [22], as well as provide rural households with supplemental income opportunities through their sale in markets [5]
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